American Spinning Cemetery

It’s strange how these discoveries start out, sometimes. I had popped out to run some errands – purchasing bulbs for a finicky light fixture in a bathroom, which required specialized bulbs from Home Depot. As always, I have at least one camera (besides my iPhone) with me in the car. I liked the way the afternoon light was falling on the buildings, so I decided to ride around Greenville a bit and take some photos.

My aimless wandering led me through the mill villages between Poinsett Highway and Old Buncombe Road. I soon found myself at the old American Spinning textile mill, exploring some of the shadier streets. That’s when I stumbled upon the old cemetery associated with the mill village. I had to get out and explore.

I had approached the cemetery from the rear. The area was fenced and there was a gate at the back, as well as an open lot. This made me wonder if the cemetery had been associated with a now-missing church. The “front” of the cemetery borders Fair Street.

Overall, the cemetery looked very neatly kept. Individual family plots were a bit overgrown, but for the most part everything was in good order. Most of the damage to stones looked like natural wear and tear.

The graves didn’t look particularly old. In fact, a couple of them looked quite recent, as if this were still an active cemetery.

I even found a family of Taylors. I don’t know if they are any relation, but I doubt it.

There were no signs to identify the cemetery. I couldn’t tell if it were another mill cemetery, or if it had been associated with a church. As with the cemetery I found a couple of weeks ago, there seemed to be lots of children’s markers. There were many with lamb figures. Sadly, most of the lambs had lost their heads due to weathering and deterioration.

I looked more closely at the back of the cemetery, where I had parked. There was one pile of rubble that might have been a church, but it was hard to tell.

I left and headed back toward the mill, snapping a couple of shots of it, and of a homeless encampment under a railroad bridge.

I drove through the mill village to see if there were any clue about the mysterious cemetery, but I found none. I decided to head on back home.

Even armed with all my online references, identifying the cemetery proved to be tricky. GNIS had no name listed for that location. I had several clear names with birth/death dates, so I went to Find-a-Grave and searched using that data. That led me to the correct name. This was, in fact, a mill cemetery. I had found the American Spinning Cemetery, also known as the Sampson Cemetery.

According to local historian Dr. Judy Bainbridge, of all the mill cemeteries, American Spinning is the only one with an active cemetery association. Burials are still performed here, and the association maintains the grounds. That explains the good condition in which I found the place.

Oscar Sampson started the mill in 1895 as the American Spinning Company. It was known informally as the Sampson Mill, and the surrounding village known as “Sampsonia” or simple Sampson.” The earliest grave in the cemetery is from 1899, which would make sense. The latest was from 2007.

As I had done with the Monaghan Mill Cemetery, I looked at the number of child interments compared to overall burials. There were 101 out of 293 for children under the age of 10, or 34%. That rate was even higher than Monaghan. These didn’t seem to be clustered around a specific time period, though. There were many from the early 1900s, but others that came later. Again, it seems that infant mortality was a sad fact of mill life.

Judy Bainbridge had written an article some years back about forgotten mill village cemeteries. Now that I had stumbled upon two of them, I wanted to find others. That would be the next quest.

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13 thoughts on “American Spinning Cemetery”

I was at first puzzled at the number of leaning headstones in this cemetery. Then I noticed that there appeared to be a number of fire ant nests around some that were not yet leaning. I believe that the nests are the cause of this. As the ants bring the soil to the surface, it gets moved bit by bit by heavy rains, wind, mowers, and other means, leaving a cavern beneath the surface. Eventually, the stones tip over as the caverns collapse. Another reason to curse the person or persons who imported (by accident, of course) this accursed critter….

My husband has several relatives buried in American Spinning Cemetrey. I found their names listed on find a grave..they have no markers so I have no idea where their graves are. I got in touch with the Church close to the cemetrey, they said they were over it but did not have a map of plots. They even said they are letting people still be buried there. I called some of the county and city offices of Greenville but did not have any luck. I wish I could get in touch with who owns the land. Thought maybe they would have map of plots.

Hi – I am a librarian and do genealogical research for folks through Find-a-Grave. If you can find out which funeral home was in charge of your relatives’ burial and contact them, they should be able to tell you where your relatives are buried in the cemetery, even if they do not have a marker or the marker has been lost.
Leslie B.

I am so curious about the American Spinning Cemetery. My great great grandmother is buried here (1906) Martha A Cox Jones. I would like to take a trip to Greenville just to research more of her family line. I can not find the names of her parents. Thank you for the details of your trip and sharing them.

Dear Leslie, I’m try very hard to find any info on a monument which list names of people buried in a cemetery near Talley Street. I found a picture that shows names of people buried on boulevard Baptist Church Property. My Grandmother’s Brother was buried there in 1916. His name was Noah Newton and any info to the location of the monument would help Me a lot.

Hi Jerry,
I know where Talley Street is and there are several churches near there, however I’m not familiar with one named Boulevard Baptist. Perhaps the name has changed. I’ll be glad to do a little searching and see if I’m able to locate the monument or your uncle’s grave site. I’ll let you know if I’m able to find anything. It may take a few days, though, as it’s been raining buckets here and it’s not supposed to let up for the next several days. Ciao!

My Grandparents Tennie and Maggie Christian, two uncles and a half brother are buried in the northwest corner of the cemetery. My mother put the monument for her parents and her son. She fenced around the graves. My husband and I try to keep the graves clean. About the problem with some of the monuments many were vandalized until the fence was put up. There are a lot of the graves that now unmarked.

Dear Leslie, I’m try very hard to find any info on a monument which list names of people buried in a cemetery near Talley Street. I found a picture that shows names of people buried on boulevard Baptist Church Property. My Grandmother’s Brother was buried there in 1916. His name was Noah Newton and any info to the location of the monument would help Me a lot.